Mary van Balen

LINK: Text of President Obama's State of the Union Address

PHOTO: CHARLES DHARAPAK/ ASSOCIATED PRESS
Two phrases from President Obama’s State of the Union address remain with me this morning. One is “a deficit of trust.” He was talking about American’s lack of trust in their government and the lack of trust between our political parties. It makes working together impossible. No compromise, no legislation, no progress. The status quo reigns when those responsible for leadership and change don’t believe that others share their vision and genuinely want what is best not for their re-election but for the country.

The second phrase came early in the speech when Mr. Obama recalled times of uncertainty of the very existence of the United States. It was not predetermined or destined to be. “We chose to move forward as one people,” Mr. Obama said. As a people we must chose to move into the future, but there is no movement without trust.

Implications of the national deficit of trust are clear: No movement. No change. The poor, uninsured, and unemployed will continue to live in fear of illness or accident. They will wake up worried about basic food and shelter. Jobs that do not provide living wages will continue to look better than no job at all, a reality many stare in the face everyday.

This morning I am thinking also of effects of a “trust deficit” in situations other than the current impasse in the US government. Lack of trust effects relationships between countries making fear mongering easier and isolation attractive. Combating ignorance and the fear that fuels prejudice and violence is impossible when one feels threatened by the other.

Employees generally are not as productive as they might be when suspicious supervisors and managers monitor their every move expecting the worst. When enthusiasm for the company’s work is lost and everyone looks out for personal advancement at the expense of others, morale plummets.

Relationships crumble without trust. Marriages fail when the partners no longer believe that the other has the best interest of both at heart, but focuses on himself or herself instead. Friendships wither when not watered by trust.

And what of the most personal form of trust: trust in God-With-Us? In the wake of Haiti’s devastating earthquake, I have heard people question the existence of God: “It makes belief in a benevolent God hard to hold on to,” one person said. The age-old question of God and suffering resurfaces whenever a natural disaster occurs. Tragedies in our personal lives can elicit similar responses: serious illness or death of a loved one, loss of job, betrayal, or shattered relationships.

How does one continue to trust when the evidence seems to indicate otherwise?  Read More 

LINKS: America.gov: Engaging the World , Food Not Bombs Website

On January 7, U.S. Agriculture Secretary Tom Vilsack announced that the Obama administration was working with the Afghan government and its agricultural framework to stabilize the country by providing its people with means to grow food for local consumption as well as export and with profitable alternatives to growing poppies. Another goal of this project is to remove some of the Taliban's recruitment tools: People who are able to feed themselves, earn a living for their families, and who receive help attaining those goals from their government are less likely to be convinced to join the Taliban whose goals and ideology they do not share.

A Jan. 8 article on "America.gov" written by staff writer Stephen Kaufman, quotes Vilsack: "To develop a relationship of trust with the Afghan government and farmers, concrete results are needed, he said. For that reason, 'we’re spending a lot of time … trying to listen to precisely what the Afghans need of us.'

A good idea: listening to those we want to help.  Read More 

LINKS:
QUOTES: Martin Luther King
I HAVE A DREAM SPEECH AND VIDEO
WE SHALL OVERCOME: Historic places of the Civil Rights Movement
ROBERT GRAETZ'S BOOK: A White Preacher's Message on Race and Reconcilliation

Years ago, I sat in Dexter Avenue Baptist Church, Montgomery Alabama and watched a young service woman speaking with an elderly gentleman in the front pew: One was white; the other was black. Fifty-five years ago that encounter most likely would not have taken place. I imagined the space filled with voices of Martin Luther King Jr. and crowds gathered in prayer supporting the Montgomery bus boycott.

It began with Jo Ann Robinson, head of the Women's Political Council, who along with other women mimeographed thousands of flyers asking Montgomery Blacks to boycott buses on the day Rosa Park's case was heard in court. The boycott's success encouraged the black community, and the following day many gathered in Dexter Avenue Church, formed the Montgomery Improvement Association, and spurred on by its newly elected leader, Martin Luther King, Jr., called for a citywide bus boycott.

When we visited the museum at Dexter Ave. Baptist Church and watched historic newscasts, my young adult children expressed horror at scenes of protesters being attacked by dogs and thrown to the ground by water blasts from fire hoses. For many adults today, the early Civil Rights movement in this country is ancient history.

That reality prompted me to invite Rev. Robert and Jeannie Graetz to speak in my adult Even Start Class. He had accepted his first assignment as a Lutheran minister in Montgomery Alabama the same year Martin Luther King Jr. became pastor at Dexter Ave. The only white minister to publicly and actively support the bus boycott along with Jeannie, his family's home were fire bombed and his life threatened. Their neighbor, Rosa Parks, helped clean up the mess left by the bombs and took a neighborhood collection to replace tableware smashed in the attack.  Read More 

The news and images coming out of Haiti are devastating. How does a country,even with the help of nations around the world, cope with a natural disaster of this magnitude? Once aid arrives - food, water, medicine, personnel - how will it reach those who need it when Haiti's infrastructure, poor to begin with, is buried and tangled with rubble?

How do organizations and people charged with coordinating rescue and aid efforts put one foot in front of the other when chaos surrounds them? Where do they start? Do they work like Mother Teresa did, going out and picking up one dying person among hundreds of others?

This earthquake and its human toll focuses attention again on true poverty in our world, forcing those in wealthy countries to look at the uncomfortable truth of injustice and poverty that is easy to ignore most of the time. Our personal concerns pale in comparison to those of the people of Port au Prince tonight.

In Haiti, dead pile up in morgues and along the streets. Many survivors are afraid to go into homes and buildings left standing, fearing they, too, might collapse when aftershocks hit. Dazed,people wander the streets with no place to go. How do they cope in this country, poorest in the Western Hemisphere, and least equipped to handle this catastrophe? How does hope survive?

At times like these, when victims and those who seek to help both are overwhelmed, can we remember that God walks with us? Or believe that God exists? Even in the midst of unspeakable suffering some in Port au Prince must. In an AP article (Jan 14), correspondent Jonathan Katz writes of song rising from those huddled together as night falls. Their prayer is an unexpected one, like Job's from the dung heap: “Beni Swa Leternel.” “Blessed be the Lord.”


Many organizations are accepting monetary donations. Click here to make donation: Catholic Relief Services
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PHOTO: MARY VAN BALEN -MOON,VENUS, JUPITER OVER COLLEGEVILLE INSTITUTE

After writing about the Kepler Mission, I remembered an article my Trappist friend, Fr. Maurice Flood, sent to me years ago. It was from the July 1994 issue of Sky & Telescope and told the story of Trappist sisters at Santa Rita Abbey in Arizona who shared the love of contemplating the night sky. One in particular, Sr. Sherly Chen, a graduate of Yale, shared her thoughts with author David H. Levy.

Levy was struck by the connections between science and religion as he listened to the sisters, experienced their prayer, and gazed with them at the clear night sky. I remembered that Chen had shared a poem she had written after considering the distance starlight had to travel to be seen by her that night. I found the article and poem in my old office:

Light

which left the Pleiades
2,000 years ago
arrived just when
a Mayan's eye
peered upwards
through the stone shaft
of the Temple of the Jaguar Sun.

Other rays

began their earthward Journey
before I even existed
to meet my eye
in the expanse of desert sky
after Vigils.

Grace

sets out from God
before I need it
rushes light-years toward me
meets me at the very moment I fall.

When it arrives
I am there.

 Read More 

PHOTO: NASA - KEPLER FIELD OF VIEW

Last Thursday I noticed a news release about NASA’s Kepler Mission that is searching a small part of our galaxy to locate planets orbiting its star in a “habitable zone,” planets that could be capable of supporting life. We are looking for extraterrestrials.

As one who has long hoped that intelligent life exists on other planets and that connection with ET’s would happen in my lifetime, the article was intriguing. I am a Star Trek fan and enjoy watching science fiction movies and reading books that deal with “encounters of the third kind.” For reasons unknown, I imagine ET’s as peaceful, intelligent creatures who would have something to teach our warring, violent race.

Such images have been fed not only by movies, but also by a couple of my favorite authors: Madeleine L’Engle and C. S. Lewis. In L’Engle’s groundbreaking novel, “A Wrinkle in Time,” Charles Wallace and Meg Murray and their friend Calvin rescued Mr. Murray from a horrible planet, Camazotz, and traveled to different planets by “tessering” or moving along wrinkles in the time/space continuum.

Once, Meg, Calvin, and Mr. Murray found themselves on a strange planet where the inhabitants were beasts covered with soft fur and who had long tentacles instead of eyes or a mouth. Despite their differences, the earthlings and beasts were able to communicate. The beasts healed Meg who arrived frozen from her travel and revealed that they, too, were fighting the blackness that was in control of Camazotz and threatened the universe. I loved reading that chapter out loud to my fourth grade students, and we fell in love with the beats who had no eyes but who knew more than their human guests with the sense of sight.

The Narnia Chronicles, a seven volume fantasy written in the 1950’s by C. S. Lewis, features four English children, Peter, Susan, Edmund, and Lucy who wander into the world of Narnia through the back of an old wardrobe fashioned from wood of a magic tree. Aslan the lion is the central character in all seven volumes, the creator and ruler of Narnia, a divine presence.

In “The Magician’s Nephew,” still pools in the “wood between the worlds” are portals through which characters are transported to different worlds. As I read and re-read this book, images of meeting creatures from places utterly foreign to my own played in my mind.

At the end of “The Voyage of the Dawn Treader,” when Aslan tells Lucy and Edmund they are too old to return to Narnia and must become more involved in their own world, Lucy cries at the thought of not being with Aslan again: "It isn't Narnia, you know," sobbed Lucy. "It's you. We shan't meet you there. And how can we live, never meeting you?"

"But you shall meet me, dear one," said Aslan.

"Are -- are you there too, Sir?" said Edmund.

"I am," said Aslan. "But there I have another name. You must learn to know me by that name.”


"How many names does God have?" I wonder while contemplating the thought that somewhere in the universe, other creatures have been made to have a relationship with the Holy One, the Creator, the One we cannot limit by our imaginations. The One whose love is so great that it cannot be poured out only to human beings, but could well fashion others to share in the joy of receiving the infinite desire of God to give God’s self away.

How could such a belief or hope threaten faith? The news release, written Jan 7, 2010 by Seth Borenstein of the Associated Press, mentioned Rev. Jose Funes, the Jesuit director of the Vatican Observatory, commenting on the annual American Astronomical Society conference last week: “These are big questions that reflect upon the meaning of the human race in the universe.”

In a May 14, 2008 interview published in L’OSSERVATORE ROMANO, responding to a question about whether belief in extraterrestrials would create problem for faith, Funes said, “I believe no. As a multiplicity of creatures exist on earth, so there could be other beings, also intelligent, created by God. This does not contrast with our faith because we cannot put limits on the creative freedom of God. To say it with Saint Francis, if we consider earthly creatures as “brother” and “sister,” why cannot we also speak of an “extraterrestrial brother?” It would therefore be a part of creation.”

I am in good company and wish the Kepler Mission Godspeed and good luck!

PHOTO: NASA - April 16, 2009, STAR CLUSTER NGC 6791 FROM KEPLER FIRST LIGHT IMAGE  Read More 

PHOTO: http://farm2.static.flickr.com/1276/868518932_b245596a7c.jpg?v=0

The story out of New York City this week about new clothing purposely ruined and dumped into the trash behind major retailers H&M and WalMart would be disturbing at any time, but coming so close to Christmas, the season of giving, and in the middle of a frigid winter makes it all the more upsetting. Graduate student,Cynthia Magnus, found bags of new clothes purposely slashed and made unwearable behind both H&M and WalMart earlier this week.

I am not the only blogger or journalist to express outrage, but the deeper reality is even more upsetting: These are not isolated events; they are not new; they are not limited to clothing stores.

Venting my distress to a friend elicited this story: "Oh, I used to work at a discount store in Kentucky, one of those that sold lots of things for just a dollar. I was told to destroy all kinds of things. If dishes didn't sell, I had to break them. I shredded curtains, and cut up clothes. We were watched, and if we didn't do it, we would have been fired. On days when we knew no one from the company would be watching, we just threw things out without destroying them. But we had to be careful. One day, a man came in. He was freezing. He had no coat or anything. I used my discount and bought him a coat and gloves and a hat. I wasn't supposed to do that, but I couldn't let him go out with nothing." Read More 

IMAGE: ADORATION OF THE MAGI by Giotto

One Epiphany long ago my mother smiled when I asked her, "Where's the other Wise Guy?" and replied that he had been lost during our recent move. As I played with the camels, sheep and two mysterious "kings," I hoped the third one had found a new home, someplace warm to spend Christmas. Imagine, following a star to find baby Jesus, a baby whose birth was acknowledged by the forces in the far flung universe.

Later, I learned that Matthew's gospel (the only one that mentions the magi) was short on details and what I learned as a child was as much legend as anything else. No Matter. Three astrologers searching through Hebrew Scriptures looking for an explanation for an amazing cosmological event still captures my imagination. Even the Pope today used them as an metaphor for the compatibility of science and faith.

The Epiphany is celebrated in Christian churches as the first time Jesus was revealed to the wide world beyond Bethlehem and Judaism. The wise men represent all the rest of humanity at the manger, foreshadowing the reality that took the disciples and perhaps even Jesus some time to figure out: God's love is for all people. We are all children of the Most High.

Today, as I drove to the doctor's office for a check-up, I paid particular attention to people who were out on the cold, snowy morning: A father at a bus stop, a modern shepherd with his flock of four children, one in a stroller, carefully bundled against the wind; a man wearing a black stocking cap pulled low over his ears, his hands shoved into his pockets to stay warm; a young woman munching an apple for breakfast, a backpack slung over her shoulder, waiting for a ride to campus; people driving cars I passed or that passed by me on the freeway.

I tried to look with wise men's eyes, seeing God's beloved braving the elements to be about the work of their daily lives. "Each one," I told myself, "holds some bit of God in their hearts." Like the wise men, I should honor them, for who they are, for the Divinity that enlivens them from within.I should offer my gifts, as simple as they are, joining in the effort to bring the world a little closer to the Kingdom ushered in by a baby.

"Where's the other Wise Guy?" She is here. He is each one of us.  Read More 

A new semester is about to begin, but I will not be teaching this time around. Instead, I am joining a host of other Americans looking for full time employment. As much as I enjoy teaching theology as an adjunct instructor, I cannot give the time and attention required for large classes while searching for a job that comes with benefits. Perhaps the opportunity to return to the university classroom will come again. Meanwhile, I am searching the Internet for openings and filling out applications.

This exercise requires me to revisit my educational background and employment history time after time. I imagine the application of a once stay-at-home mom who worked at a variety of part time jobs while keeping the home-fires burning looks different from those filled out by career people who have lost their jobs to downsizing and the poor economy. Read More 

Many people seem eager to say goodbye to the holidays. Christmas trees that went up the day after Thanksgiving were taken down December 26. Candy canes and decorations are piled into shopping carts with “75% OFF” signs taped to them, and Valentine's Day goodies have taken their places on store shelves.

Having grown up in a house that saw neither tree nor candle before Christmas morning (Santa brought it all), I am not ready for business as usual. Christmas lasts twelve days, and I have three left. Christmas is a holiday to savor. Madeleine L’Engle called the incarnation the “Glorious Impossible,” and so it is.

One day is hardly enough to celebrate God’s coming to tell us that we are the desire of the Divine Heart and Love is the way in. Jesus showed us that even death would not stand in the way of Infinite Love. So, I am still singing along with Christmas carols as I drive, writing holiday greetings, and baking cookies.

I celebrated 2010’s arrival with my brother and sister-in-law and two of their friends. Tom had built an amazing snow squirrel in their backyard, a truly unique sight! We laughed, ate homemade pizza and salad, and watched a movie in the living room lit by Christmas tree glow.

Simple things: Sharing tea and conversation with friends; dinner with my daughters; enjoying wine and playing family games. Walking in snow. Wrapping up those I love with a warm embrace. Ordinary joys become more delicious when I take time to recognize the wonder of them all.

I can hear Fr. Michael Himes saying if something is always and everywhere true, it must be noticed and celebrated somewhere, sometime.

God is everywhere and always with us. These twelve days of Christmas are a time to stop and notice, to rejoice in the gift of Divine Self that was given in a complete and extraordinary way in the life of Jesus.  Read More